Sorrell Booke was a very brilliant man. He taught himself five languages including Japanese and Russian. He also held a Master's degree in fine arts from Yale University. He also was also a master of voices and could speak with many different accents.
Sorrell was born in Buffalo, New York on January 4, 1930. His interest in acting began at the early age of 3 when family members would encourage him to get up on a stool and tell jokes and do imitations.
When Sorrell was a young boy, he would send for all the scripts to radio shows he could get his hands on. He would then play all the parts doing all of the different voices. At the age of 9 he discovered that some of the radio shows originated in his home town of Buffalo. He called the station and got an audition which he won. He was a fixture on Buffalo radio from then until when he graduated from high school.
At 16, Sorrell went to Columbia University where he played his first Southern- politician role,Senator Cottonmouth in the campus variety show. Durring the summers, Sorrell worked straw-hat theaters where he played the parts of nice old men and built all the sets. Woodworking was one of his hobbies along with reading. After Columbia, he went to Yale and then to Massachusetts' famous Provincetown Playhouse, where he played the classics. He had a detour in his acting carrer when the Korean War broke out. There he spent two years in counterintelligence.
When Sorrell was discharged from the service. He enbarked on his Broadway career where he continued to play the roles of older men in plays such as "Purlie Victorious", "Finian's Rainbow", and "Heartbreak House".
Sorrell also has many movie and television credits. Some of the movies he was in are "Freaky Friday", "Fail-Safe", "Up the Down Staircase","Bank Shot", "Mastermind", and "What's Up, Doc?".
Some of his television credits as well as "The Dukes of Hazzard" include "M*A*S*H", "All in the Family" where he played Archie Bunker's boss, "Dr. Kildare", "Hawaii Five-O", "Cannon", "Rockford Files", "Little House on the Prarie", "Kung Fu", "Gunsmoke", "Alice" in the role of Boss Hogg who was Jolene's cousin, and "Full House" as Santa.
Sorrell would perform most of his stunts as Boss Hogg. He only weighed 175 pounds. He was stuffed with foam rubber to achieve Boss Hogg's 52" waist. He had twelve white suits in his wardrobe for Boss Hogg because they kept messing them up in the story line splashing boss with paint, having him fall in mud, etc.
Sorrell's career turned full circle in a way during his final years. He was doing voice over work for cartoons which was much like radio. He did voices for "Tiny Toon Adventures", "Gravedale High" and the full-length feature "Rock-a-doodle".
Sorrell Booke passed away on Febuary 11, 1994 after a battle with cancer. His memory will long live in the hearts of Dukes of Hazzard fans.
